The application claims the benefit of Japanese Application No. 2000-083673 filed in Japan on Mar. 24, 2000, the contents of which are incorporated by this reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric wiring forming system for forming wiring patterns on the material of a board for mounting electrical elements.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a common conventional method for manufacturing either a hard-type printed wiring board or flexible printed wiring board on which are mounted electrical elements, such as the ICs incorporated into electronic equipment, a glass fiber reinforced epoxy resin board, for example, is utilized as a nonconductive polymer, and a copper foil board that has copper foil, which is a conductive metal layer, plated over the entire surface thereof, is used. Chemical etching is performed on the above-mentioned copper foil board, copper foil other than the wiring pattern part is removed, leaving only the copper foil of the conductive pattern part, and a printed wiring board is achieved. Furthermore, there are cases in which plating is applied to the above-mentioned copper foil conductive pattern part. Furthermore, a dichromate solution is generally used as the etching solution for the above-mentioned chemical etching process.
Conversely, when forming a wiring pattern on a printed wiring board, the circuit writer technology disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. H 8-17269 as a method that does not make use of the above-mentioned copper foil board is a technology for manufacturing the above-mentioned printed wiring board by using a nonconductive insulating board material (blank) that is not a copper foil, and applying by extrusion a paste-like conductive material along a wiring pattern locus on the above-mentioned board material. A conductive paste, which is a paste-like conductive polymer in which an epoxy resin is mixed with a metal (silver flakes, silver clusters, silver balls), is used as the conductive material for forming the above-mentioned wiring pattern.
According to the conventional electric wiring printed wiring board manufacturing method, which uses the above-mentioned copper foil board, first of all, because of the long hours needed to prepare for volume production, such as the preparation of a mask for a wiring pattern, this conventional method is not suitable for cases that call for small lot production and short delivery times. Further, the plating and other processes for the above-mentioned wiring pattern part require several hours, and manufacturing time is long. Furthermore, with the conventional method, waste liquid treatment is essential during chemical etching, making it undesirable from the standpoint of the environment.
Further, with a circuit writer of the above-mentioned Japanese Patent Publication No. H 8-17269, because silver material, which is a precious metal, is used as the conductive material for forming a circuit pattern, the cost of a printed wiring board increases, and its applicability is also limited. Further, the above-mentioned circuit writer uses a carriage, on which are mounted a tank that holds the conductive paste along the shape of a wiring pattern, a conductive paste discharge opening, and a heater arranged in the vicinity of the discharge opening, and the carriage thereof must be driven and controlled along two axes in the X, Y directions. Consequently, the above-mentioned tank- and heater-equipped carriage has to be moved integrally, and movement positioning control can be difficult to carry out, the support structures for the tank and carriage are complex, equipment costs can increase, and inspection and maintenance has proved difficult at times.
The present invention is designed to solve the above-mentioned deficiencies, and an object thereof is the provision of an electric wiring forming system, which is a system for manufacturing an electric wiring board, and which eliminates the impact on the environment resulting from waste liquid during board manufacturing, reduces the time for board manufacturing preparation, uses inexpensive metal material for wiring pattern forming, and furthermore, also has a system which has a simple configuration.
An electric wiring forming system of the present invention comprises: a cylinder, comprising a heater for melting a conductive metal; a screw for discharging the above-mentioned conductive metal; a drawing die for forming a desired discharge diameter in a discharge opening for discharging a conductive metal onto a board for mounting electrical elements; a moving stage for moving the above-mentioned board for mounting electrical elements; and a controlling device for controlling the movement of the above-mentioned moving stage, and in the above-mentioned electric wiring forming system, the above-mentioned board for mounting electrical elements is mounted on the above-mentioned moving stage, and is laid out having a predetermined clearance relative to the above-mentioned drawing die. Then, the above-mentioned conductive metal, which is melted, is discharged via the above-mentioned drawing die onto the above-mentioned board for mounting electrical elements, and a desired wiring pattern is formed.
Other characteristics and benefits of the present invention will be made clear by means of the following explanation.